Safety



(No Model.)

A.l H. HALL. Safety Appliance for Elevatofrs.

med 1mg/1311880.

INVENTR ate Q@ Y N. PETERS. PHOTO-LJTHDGHPMER, WASHINGTON. D. C.

WITNEEEEE UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

ALFRED H. HALL, OF BSTON, MASSACHUSETTS.

SAFETY APPLIANCE FOR ELEVATORS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 230,006, dated July 13, 1880.

Application filed May Q7, 1880.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, ALFRED H. HALL, of Boston, in the county of Suffolk and State of Massachusetts, have invented an Improved Safety Appliance for Elevators, of which the following is a full, clear, and exact description, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, making part of this speciiication, in which- Figure l represents an elevator-car and its well with my improvements applied thereto. Fig. 2 is a similar view, showing a method of operating the wedge from within the car 5 Fig. 3, detail.

It is very essential that elevators be provided with means whereby the car may be stopped upon the breaking of the hoistingrope, and various devices have been invented for this purpose. Most of them relate to levers or cams which are attached to the car and are arranged to engage with racks upon the Walls of the elevator-well upon the breaking of the hoisting-rope, and in actual practice many of these methods have proved to be impracticable.

My invention consists in certain details of construction, as hereinafter set forth and specifically claimed.

In the said drawings, A represents an elevator-car, B, two walls of the elevator-well 5 C, the hoisting-rope by which the elevator is raised and lowered; D, a wedge-shaped block having the straight surface a, which is adapted to bear against the wall of the elevator and the inclined surface el.

The block is suspended by means of the rope d2, and is raised and lowered with the elevatorcar thereby, the point of the wedge being as close to the bottom of the elevator-car as practicable. In some instances it may extend somewhat above the lower line of the bottom of the elevator-car, and, if desirable, the lower corner of the elevator-car may be slightly cut away, as represented in Figs. l and 2, to more readily receive the point of the wedge.

The Wedge-block may be raised and lowered by the same drum that is used in winding and unwinding the car-hoisting rope, or it may be operated in any lother desirable way, the essential feature of this part of the invention being the wedge-shaped block, not connected with (No model.)

' the car or its hoisting-rope, arranged to travel with the car, immediately below it, in such a position that upon the breaking of the hoisting-rope the car shall descend thereon with as4 little momentum as possible, and become wedged between the walls of the elevator-well. The wedge-block is connected with the car by means of a lever. or some other suitable device in the car may be used for regulating the position of the wedge-block in relation to the bottom of the car, and even for drawing the wedge-block in that position for the purposeV of stopping the car if the independent suspending-rope be not employed; but I prefer that the independent suspending-rope be used.

In Fig. 3 I represent a modification in the shape of the Wedge-block, in which `there is arranged -on one wall of the elevator-well a series of projections extending from the bottom of the well to the top, and upon or close to which the wedge-block, having upon the face which travels on the side of the well a. similar series of elevations and depressions, whereby, upon the breaking of the hoistingrope and the descent of the car upon the wedge, the wedge is more securely held in position than if no means for locking the wedge were employed.

The elevator-car, if desired, may be provided with teeth F upon its lower end, opposite the wedge-block, which shall project outward therefrom and are securely fastened thereto, and which, when the elevator-car is canted by coming in contact with the wedge, will be forced into the side of the elevatorwell 5 and like teeth, for the same purpose, to act in the same way, may be attached to the upper edge or corner of the elevator-car above the wedge. The rope for supporting the wedgeblock preferably should run in a groove or recess in the elevator-well.

The advantages of this invention over the other safety appliances consist principally in its efficiency in operation and its cheapness of construction, and in'its being less liable to get IOO having a movement with the elevator-ear, and vided with teeth F'upon its lower and upper 1o means whereby the location of theWedge-bloek corners or lower corner or edges or edge, subin relation to the ear maybe varied from withstantially as and for the purpose described.

in the ear, substantially as and for the pur- Witness my hand this 22d day of May, A. D.

poses described. 1880. p

2. The combination of' aWedge-shaped bloeig ALFRED H. HALL. having a movement in an elevator-Well eoin- In presence ofeident with that of Jche elevator-ear by an in- F. ERNEST CABOT, dependent supporting-rope, and the ear pro- SAMUEL W. TUCKER. 

